President Donald Trump’s administration on Wednesday revoked landmark guidance to public schools letting transgender students use the bathrooms of their choice, reversing a signature initiative of former Democratic President Barack Obama.

Obama had instructed public schools last May to let transgender students use the bathrooms matching their chosen gender identity, threatening to withhold funding for schools that did not comply. Transgender people hailed the step as victory for their civil rights.

Trump, a Republican who took office last month, rescinded those guidelines, even though they had been put on hold by a federal judge, arguing that states and public schools should have the authority to make their own decisions without federal interference.

The Justice and Education departments will continue to study the legal issues involved, according to the new, superseding guidance that will be sent to public schools.

About 200 people gathered in front of the White House to protest against Trump’s action, waving rainbow flags and chanting: “No hate, no fear, trans students are welcome here.”

The rainbow flag is the symbol of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, or LGBT, people.

“We all know that Donald Trump is a bully, but his attack on transgender children today is a new low,” said Rachel Tiven, chief executive of Lambda Legal, which advocates for LGBT people.

…

Transgender legal advocates have criticized the “states’ rights” argument, saying federal law and civil rights are matters for the federal government to enforce, not the states.

White House spokesman Sean Spicer said the administration was pressed to act now because of the pending U.S. Supreme Court case, G.G. versus Gloucester County School Board.

That case pits a Virginia transgender boy, Gavin Grimm, against officials who want to deny him use of the boys’ room at his high school.

Although the Justice Department is not a party in the case, it typically would want to make its views heard. The Trump administration action on Wednesday also withdrew an Education Department letter in support of Grimm’s case.

“I’ve faced my share of adversaries in rural Virginia. I never imagined that my government would be one of them. We will not be beaten down by this administration,” Grimm, 17, told the protest outside the White House.

COURTS MAY HAVE FINAL SAY

The federal law in question, known as Title IX, bans sex discrimination in education. But it remains unsettled whether Title IX protections extend to a person’s gender identity.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement that the Obama guidelines “did not contain sufficient legal analysis or explain how the interpretation was consistent with the language of Title IX.”

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman vowed to ensure Title IX and his state’s civil rights protections are enforced.

“President Trump’s decision to rescind anti-discrimination protections for transgender students is yet another cruel move by an administration committed to divisive policies that roll back the clock on civil rights,” he said in a statement.

The courts are likely to have the final say over whether Title IX covers transgender students. The Supreme Court could pass on that question in the Virginia case and allow lower courts to weigh in, or go ahead and decide what the law means.

It also covered a host of other issues, such as the importance of addressing transgender students by their preferred names and pronouns and schools’ responsibility to prevent harassment and bullying of transgender children.

Thirteen states led by Texas sued to stop the Obama guidelines, and a U.S. district judge in Texas temporarily halted their full implementation.

The White House previously boasted of Trump’s support for LGBT rights, noting in a Jan. 31 statement that he was the first Republican presidential nominee to mention the community in his nomination acceptance speech.

“Revoking the guidance shows that the president’s promise to protect LGBT rights was just empty rhetoric,” James Esseks, director of the American Civil Liberties Union‘s LGBT project, said in a statement.

In May 2016 President Barack Obama instructed public schools to allow transgender students to use the bathroom they felt most comfortable using; schools refusing to comply with the instructions risked losing federal funding. The guidelines also included instructions for teachers to use students’ preferred names and pronouns in class. On Wednesday, February 22, President Trump rescinded the instructions, arguing that states and public schools have a right to discriminate against transgender students without interference from the federal government: here.

HERE’S HOW MUCH IT COSTS TO PROTECT TRUMP TOWER IN NYC EACH DAY Where the first lady currently resides. [HuffPost]

16 thoughts on “Trump declares war on transgender people”

There weren’t a lot of barns in the Bronx, where I grew up. Probably none. The closest thing we had to a barn was a Dress Barn. In the Bronx, “West Farms” is a bus depot. (This is actually true.) Nevertheless, we city folk recognized that there is no point in CLOSING THE BARN DOOR AFTER THE HORSE IS GONE — even if we might have been somewhat unclear on the concepts of “barn” and “horse.”

It’s the same thing with Donald Trump’s wall between the US and Mexico. Or the opposite. It’s either the same or the opposite.

The vast majority of Mexicans who want to be in the United States are . . . in the United States. Building a wall won’t keep them out; it will keep them in.

Here are the facts. After NAFTA went into effect in 1994, US factory farms dumped food into the Mexican market, driving down prices in Mexico and driving Mexican farmers off the land. Immigration quickly doubled, from less than 400,000 per year to almost 800,000 in 2000. It remained high until 2007, at which point there were almost 13 million Mexicans living in the United States. But after the Great Recession hit, many Mexicans left. There are well over one million fewer Mexicans living in the United States today than in 2007. The net flow is out, not in.

Apprehensions on the Mexican border also have plummeted, from the peak of 1.6 million in 2000 to fewer than 200,000 last year. In 2000, 98 percent of all US border apprehensions were apprehensions from Mexico. Last year, only 46 percent were from Mexico. If everyone who was turned back last year had been let in, the Mexican population in the United States would have increased by less than two percent.

Why? Because if you want to be here, you’re very likely here already. The Mexican border is like that St. Louis restaurant that Yogi Berra once described: “It’s so crowded, nobody goes there anymore.”

So if we spend $15 billion to build Trump’s wall, it might do a great job of keeping the Mexicans . . . in. In the United States.

If Donald Trump wants to stop illegal immigration from Mexico, he doesn’t need a wall. He needs a time machine.

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JEWISH community centres across the US have been targeted with hoax bomb threats following a wave of attacks on cemeteries.

Eleven Jewish community centres across the country received telephoned bomb threats on Tuesday, according to the JCC Association of North America.

As with three waves of similar phone calls in January, the new threats proved to be hoaxes, the association said in a statement.

In addition, as many as 200 headstones were damaged or knocked over at a Jewish cemetery in suburban St Louis late on Sunday or early on Monday.

The FBI said it was joining with the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division to investigate “possible civil rights violations in connection with threats.”

US President Donald Trump condemned the attacks in public following a White House statement denouncing “hatred and hate-motivated violence” but failed to mention Jews or the string of threats and attacks on the Jewish community.

Speaking at the newly opened National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, notoriously racist Mr Trump said: “This tour was a meaningful reminder of why we have to fight bigotry, intolerance and hatred in all of its very ugly forms.”

The billionaire bigot went on: “The anti-semitic threats targeting our Jewish community and community centers are horrible and are painful and a very sad reminder of the work that still must be done to root out hate and prejudice and evil.”

Hillary Clinton earlier tweeted the attacks were “so troubling” that “everyone must speak out,” starting with the president.

Mr Trump drew criticism last month when he failed to mention Jews in his Holocaust Memorial Day statement.

Southern Poverty Law Centre spokesman Ryan Lenz said there had been an increase in racist incidents since Mr Trump’s election.

“People are much more willing to express their bigoted selves than they were prior to the election,” he said.

Recently, a transgender boy in Texas sought to compete against other boys in school wrestling matches. Texas, being Texas, insisted that he compete against the girls. He just won the statewide championship — against the girls.

It looks like the Texas Board of Education should have listened to a speech that Alan Grayson gave, a year ago, about the “Great American Bathroom Controversy.” It might just be the Greatest Speech You’ve Never Seen, because the media was too busy reporting on Donald Trump’s tiny, roving fingers. Enjoy!

Madam Speaker, I rise today to address the great American bathroom controversy.

On my right is a picture of someone who may or may not be recognizable to many Americans today. I will say her name. The name may be more recognizable [than the picture], to some. Her name is Christine Jorgensen.

{We’re leaving out the photo, because it would take a long time to load in your browser.]

Christine Jorgensen was born in 1926. She grew up in the Bronx, like I did. She went to high school at Christopher Columbus High School, which was near the public housing where I grew up in the Bronx. In fact, my father taught history at Christopher Columbus High School. I don’t know whether he taught Christine or not, but it is possible.

In 1945, Christine was drafted and served in the U.S. military. Now, that may be a puzzle for some of you listening to me right now who say: “I didn’t realize that women were drafted in the 1940s.” Well, at that time, Christine’s name was George, George Jorgensen. That is the name she was born with.

She was, in fact, on her birth certificate, male, something that she struggled with greatly all through the time that she was growing up. Being a male was something that she struggled with when in the military, and then after leaving military service.

In 1951, she heard about the possibility of changing her gender. So she went to Denmark and underwent three or more surgeries, plus a very substantial number of estrogen treatments, she came back to the United States, and then forever thereafter, after 1953, she was known as “Christine” Jorgensen.

Christine Jorgensen was “out.” She was well-known in America as someone who was transgendered. I knew about her story when I was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s. She made no effort to hide. She didn’t feel any shame about it.

In fact, she was proud of the fact that she had been able to take advantage of what medicine had to offer, and live the life that she felt she would have been able to live, from the beginning, if she had had the proper gender.

She had some degree of fame. Republican Vice President Spiro Agnew referred to her once in a speech, to mock one of his political opponents. She performed both as a singer and as an actress all through the 1950s, through the entire 1960s, and well into the 1970s. She was the most famous, if you will, transgendered person in America, probably to this day.

Now, I have to tell you, I don’t know exactly where she went, when she had to “go.” I don’t know exactly whether she went into a men’s room, or a ladies’ room. But here is an interesting thing: Even though this was something new under the Sun, even though America never had to address this issue before, no one ever even bothered to ask.

I don’t remember anybody saying, “Christine Jorgensen ought to go to the men’s room. She was born a male.” or, for that matter, “Christine Jorgensen identifies as a female. She should go to the ladies’ room.”

Isn’t it odd that America in the 1950s seems to have shown a lot more maturity than America is showing today, with our “great bathroom controversy” right now, where the cisgendered people of America try to dictate to the transgendered people of America where they can go to the bathroom (or at least, frankly, the more bigoted among us).

Now, we had a law [like this] passed recently in North Carolina. I am going to go out on a limb, and say that it passed almost exclusively with cisgendered Republican votes. They tried to dictate which bathroom Christine Jorgensen would have to go to, if she were alive today and had to relieve herself.

Amazingly enough they actually decided, in their “wisdom,” that Christine Jorgensen, if she were alive today (like all of her transgendered brothers and sisters) would have to go to the bathroom that she didn’t identify as but, instead, the bathroom that was on her birth certificate.

Now, this is particularly ironic: There was one form of discrimination that Christine Jorgensen did actually face during her lifetime. She was not allowed to get married. She was not allowed to get married to a man, because her birth certificate said that she was a male. She was not issued a marriage license, on account of the fact that a “male” was trying to marry a male.

Well, my goodness, here in America, just in the past 12 months or so, we finally managed to solve that problem. Christine Jorgensen could get married, today, to her lover.

But now, we have a whole new problem. Now, thanks to Republicans and bigots in North Carolina, we have a law that would require Christine Jorgensen to go to the men’s room. Think about that — think about that.

In fact, the natural consequence of that law is what I am about to show you, right here. That:

[Two girls standing in front of urinals.]

So you folks in North Carolina who are obsessed with where the transgendered go to the bathroom, this is the result you have come up with: To have people who self-identify as women, people who look like women, people who act like women — they somehow are being driven into the men’s room.

The same thing is true of the transgendered who identify as men. You are going to force people who look like men, act like men, identify as men — you are going to force them into the ladies’ room.

My God, what is wrong with you? That doesn’t make any sense at all.

Now, let me tell you something. If I had been, back in the day, growing up in New York and Christine Jorgensen happened to walk into the men’s room–it never happened, but let’s say it did–I would have thought “that is odd,” but I wouldn’t have said a word about it.

I wouldn’t have gone over to her and said to her: “Excuse me. I don’t think you are supposed to be here.” On the contrary, I would have just made an appropriate mental note, assumed that she probably found herself in the wrong bathroom, and I would have let it go.

I would not have felt any fear. I would not have felt any hatred. I would not have felt anything that would indicate to me that, somehow, I should discriminate against this person. Nevertheless, I would have thought it was odd.

What this law does is guarantee that experience, or worse. To have people who identify and look and dress and act like women forced to go into a men’s room, to have people who identify and look and act and dress as men forced to go into a ladies’ room.

Are you nuts?

Listen, I have heard that the Republican Party is the party of small government. I have also heard that, on the issue of abortion, the party of small government wants government small enough to fit into a woman’s uterus. Now it turns out that the party of small government wants government small enough to fit underneath a toilet seat.

Can’t we all be adults about this? Can’t we all be adults about this, the way we were in the 1960s and 1970s and 1980s? Do we really need a new law on this subject, much less a stupid law, a bad law, a ridiculous law?

I understand that it is possible, even in the absence of this law, that there might be some conceivable problems about this kind of situation. I am not sure exactly what they are. I am pretty sure that if everybody acted as an adult, we could get beyond them, without having to litigate over it.

I am wondering how you even enforce a law like this. What are we going to do? Are we going to have to give saliva samples every time we want to go to the bathroom, to see what gender we were born with? My goodness.

Bear in mind that there is a law against loitering. There is a law against wide stances in a bathroom. (A Republican Senator learned that a few years ago.) There is a law against disorderly conduct. There is a law against voyeurism. There is a law against indecent exposure. In fact, in a really bad situation, there are laws against assault and even rape.

So why do we need a law to dictate that people who identify as men have to go to the ladies’ room, and people who identify as ladies have to go to the men’s room?

We had laws like that once. We used to say that we didn’t want White people to have to be uncomfortable going to the bathroom with Black people. I represent part of the State of Florida. I can remember when we had laws like that. And then, somehow or other, we pulled ourselves together, and we realized how ridiculous that was.

Well, how is this any different? Thank goodness the Attorney General recognizes that it is not. People who are cisgendered have no right to dictate where people who are transgendered urinate, any more than people who are White have the right to dictate where people who are Black do it. That is not America. Let’s show some common sense.

Now, if we did actually want to deal with real problems, we could deal with this one: A little boy and a little girl, both looking into their diapers, and the caption is: “Oh, that explains the difference in our wages.”

[Cartoon of just that.]

Now, if you want to talk about gender in America in the early 21st century, we could start with that. Why is it that women still make only 79 cents for every dollar that a man make,s in countless occupations and professions, even today? Why is that?

If you want to get to the heart of what is really going on between the sexes in America today, why don’t we do something to address that problem?

And if we want to be more dramatic about it, let’s remember the fact that, in America today, 91 percent of the victims of rape are women. Could we take our legislative energy and possibly apply it toward dealing with that problem, which actually is a problem that affects countless women across the country?

Let’s not “protect” them from having to go to the same bathroom as a transgendered person, by insisting that people who look and act and identify as men go to the bathroom with them. Let’s instead try to pass wise laws that would equalize pay between men and women, and oh, if we possibly could, reduce the incidence, the terrible incidence, of rape.

But getting back to this North Carolina law, there is a deep legal principle that this law offends. It offends me and it offends a lot of people with a good conscience.

That deep legal principle is this. It goes by four letters: M-Y-O-B.

That is an even higher law than the law that was passed by the North Carolina legislature.